have a character look at a object but all this to be a simple key range which could be moved/copied on the timeline with falloffs

e.g. two characters talking.
One character is set to look at the other.
This set a keys on the timeline, when they will look in that direction (say, frames 100-150, outside of that rang the character will drift its gaze back to the default idel animation, or it could look at a passing car if that was then set with another look at controller